This invention relates to a mobile web page computer systems for generating mobile internet pages for viewing by mobile telephones. In particular, but not exclusively, the invention relates to a central management of a mobile internet site that dynamically adapts pages to suit the strengths, weaknesses and capabilities of different mobile devices that browse it.
Presently most modern mobile telephones and devices (including pocket PCs with mobile connections) are equipped with some form of mobile internet browser. Some of these browsers are capable of viewing sites designed for viewing by personal PCs via the conventional internet whilst others are designed for only viewing pages purpose build for viewing by mobile telephone such as by WAP or I-mode. However, even with devices that can browse conventional sites it is common to construct specific mobile internet pages that are more specifically designed for easy navigation using a mobile telephone. In particular they may be designed to attempt to fit most of the page within the relatively small screen provided by most mobile telephones and better suited to navigation constraints.
Mobile devices with mobile internet browsers have significant variations in screen size, capabilities and limitations. Accordingly one specifically created mobile internet page may be viewable by one particular mobile device but on another device may not view at all or may be of unsuitable proportions such that it is difficult to navigate effectively. For example if the website is designed for a mobile phone with a large screen, a device with a smaller screen will not be able to fit all the mobile web-page on its screen. More significantly still a webpage could be designed with items such as graphical links which less advanced mobile devices may not be able to process, resulting in failure of the page.
Accordingly in order to allow multiple mobile devices to use the web-site effectively, multiple versions of the entire internet site are frequently created to cover all normal mobile devices on which users may be browsing them.
Different mobile devices require pages to be sent to them using different mark up languages and different devices deviate from set standards in some form or other. Some handsets are even found to contain bugs in their browsers that mean that what works correctly in mark up fails upon delivery to the device. Additionally the file formats of different handsets can download vary from model to model. This affects images, videos, audio files and capabilities, style of page with colours and font.
In order to cater for these differences mobile internet the developers commonly categorize mobile telephone models into groups and builds a web site for each group. This has the disadvantage that the user must build and maintain multiple versions of the same site. In order to limit the number of builds the devices are normally grouped together in broad groups which mean less than perfect delivery to some devices which are not perfectly defined by the group definition. The narrower the group the better the delivery but the more extra sites that must be designed. When a new device emerges this must be either assigned to a new group or another version of the site must be created. Additionally some devices may be developed with new capabilities and these will be overlooked or underused.